The Darkest Light  Excerpt
by Sazzlysarah
Summary: A short passage from a work in-progress. Rated M for graphic injury. Feedback is highly appreciated. Post KH2


**AN: Hello community. This is a short extract of my first attempt at fanfiction. It's been sitting on my desktop since the summer, and as far as things go, I'm suffering a bit of a motivation crisis. So I've put this up to get some (hopefully positive!) feedback. I'm open to general critique, and any specific criticism (incorrect rating, inconsistent style, you name it). So if you could take a minute to share your thoughts, I'd be ever so happy. Lot's of love to you all! Sazzlysarah.**

**Rated M for graphic injury.**

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><p>Riku's ears weren't working.<p>

Nothing was working. His legs… he wanted to move them, stretch them out but… he was confused, nothing was working right.

Pain? He wasn't sure, he felt numb, except his left hand, it felt hot, and heavy. He opened his eyes; the world was spinning so he closed them again. He couldn't breathe though his nose, it was sore and blocked (was it broken?), so his pale lips were slightly apart, and a lock of silver hair danced in the wake of his breath. After a brief moment for his mind to settle, he saw it fit for another try, to get his bearings and to perhaps see where he was, or what was wrong with him. He took a deep breath… and launched into a heaving cough, causing a burst of wet spray that could only be blood to splatter over his face and hair. His chest was now on fire, he bit down a cry, and though his eyes screwed up at the torment, two salty tears still leaked down his cheeks. His battered torso spasmed from the ripples of suffering, and torturous pain racked through every fibre of his being, from his pale skin deep into his bones. He wrenched his eyelids apart and forced himself to watch the swirling mess of colours until the nausea tempered down the agonising hurt to a slow, bearable throbbing. The lessening of the torment in turn steadied his warped vision, the world slowly grew still, and for the first time since the encounter with that monstrous behemoth he could see.

The sky and the ground were upside down. The trees, the wrong way up. Riku gave a slow blink as his mind, shattered from the pain drew together to process this information. It didn't make sense. His hand, the right one, flexed instinctively, there was something springy and damn beneath the calloused pads of his fingers, and the smooth heel of his palm. It took a second of thought before he realised he was on his back, and he was squeezing grass between his fingers, still wet with dew. Dew... his mind still struggling with the inverted landscape. Dew meant morning, wherever he was. He decided he was sprawled out on his back, but figured on a log, or rock, because his neck felt wrenched backwards. He gingerly turned to face the side; there were nothing but tall, deciduous trees, and thick scrub hugging the glistening ground in sight. His heart sank. He had learnt nothing but that Sora and the blond idiot were nowhere in sight, and that twisting his neck in such a fashion sent a stabbing ache down his spine.

Riku grit his teeth. He was exhausted from the simple task of attempting to see where he was, and the shooting assault on his usually impervious body was beginning to seriously piss him off. One of his ears was still ringing, a shrill, tired whine. As well as an unknown amount of damage to his body, he had a perforated eardrum. It was the annoyance, not the pain that was the final straw that broke the camel's back, and Riku at last had the sense of mind to summon the Curaga needed to heal his aliments, and drive energy and life into his aching limbs.

But the magic didn't come.

After his first unsuccessful attempt, Riku simply tried again, unsure if he had cast the spell at all. Perhaps his hurt had cheated his mind into believing otherwise.

The magic still didn't come, and the confusion, even faint amusement at his failure to cast the life-giving spell was now deathly serious. Riku tried again, and again, and once more, with a push for more magic than he had ever tried before. He could feel the power, like a surge below his skin, a current running through his body. When he opened his mouth to gasp at the strain at calling such a power, he could taste it in the air, as if all the flavours in the universe were teasing his tongue, but not letting him taste. Riku started to panic, and calmed soon enough. After all, there was another way he could fix this. He flexed him right arm, testing the corded muscle for resistance. None of the bones seemed broken, granted the flesh protested at the movement with a sharp stinging as if it were cut along the full length of the limb. Satisfied he would not be reduced to a quivering mess of agony, he shifted his arm a short distance to the side pocket of his pants, grasping desperately for an elixir, even a potion would be better than another instant of this suffering. The blood in his veins turned to ice as his hand met against nothing but empty space.

He was hyperventilating. He didn't notice until he heard the moist popping of the blood in his lungs, his only warning before he hacked out another shuddering cough. The cough thrashed his abused torso, and this time he cried out as the needles of fire spread down every limb, save for his lacerated arm, and his left hand, still hot from an unknown cause. When the seizing died to quaking, which in turn quieted to a quivering tremble, he drew a long, slow breath. With no means to instantly cure his wounds, it was vital he find out exactly what his wounds were. There was the crude first aid kit from Merlin in his other pocket. The bandage, rubbing alcohol… If he could dress the worst of his aliments, he had some chance of preventing any infection in the heaviest hit areas. For a time he lay still, both taking advantage of the dampened soreness, and mentally psyching himself up for the daunting task ahead of him. He had to sit up to assess the damage.

Any sudden movement would probably incite the debilitating anguish he was beginning to fear. Added to that, he wasn't sure he could handle any more injuries, and moving too quickly could make an existing laceration worse, or even create new ones if his back were also damaged. Yes. He was going to have to do this slowly. Riku knew it was going to hurt, a lot. If any of his ribs were broken, more than any other physical pain he had experienced before. He allowed himself another stretch of time of relative peace, but all too soon quashed his anxiety down, closed his eyes and began to draw his arms back, braced for the hurt to come.

It started immediately. The grass, young and soft as was, got caught in every gash on his arms, tugging on each loose flap of skin there was. Like each blade was of glass, and every pull was another tiny slice. Wincing, he stopped, and bit his lower lip, hesitating, deliberating, before he pushed himself to continue the slow torture. Silent but for the sharp whisper of the grass, he felt that there was now enough purchase to start taking the weight of his upper half. As he pressed down with both hands, an unbearable agony began to tear the left apart. Beyond pain, behind his eyelids, Riku's eyes rolled back into his head, and he thought no more.

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><p>The forest was quiet. Songbirds were silent, and ground critters had hidden in their nests and burrows. Two men walked between the trees, not quite side by side. The man leading was shorter than his companion, but walked with purpose. The other's attention drifted to inspect an odd-looking branch, or a scuff on the forest floor. They did not speak. Shadows from the swaying trees were cast across their bodies, seeming to shift and warp with every step. The air was still, and they both felt the slight drop in temperature. Alert, neither broke the silence, but continued on their journey.<p>

The shadows drew still, and their consciousness sought an easier prey.

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><p>Riku slowly became aware he was cold. As his body shifted with each shallow breath, he pieced together the memory of his failure to simply sit… his hand… it was cradled over his chest. With the last of his strength, he lifted his head as far as he could muster, to see his body, and what had happened to his hand to cause his faint, and his brain simply shut down. He stared for a full minute before his neck gave out, and rested back against the drying earth.<p>

His hand had been… destroyed. His thumb was torn back, down his wrist. His fingers, a broken, bleeding mess. Only his index and middle fingers were complete, if shattered beyond repair, bent at odd, unnatural angles. His ring finger had been severed down to the second knuckle, and his last was gone completely. His face was blank as these facts ate into his sanity. He had tried to shield against the attack with his left hand out, and his inadequate defence had been obliterated.

The damaged had continued up his arm. There were small portions of muscle that were simply not there, like something had bitten chunks from the limb. There was no bleeding, his flesh and been roasted by the blast, and had cauterised the gaping holes left behind. The burns had not stopped there. His side was blistered and raw; the skin was crisp, and shiny between the blisters, and it had torn in some places when he had moved, causing fresh rivulets of blood cascade from the tears in his flesh. His legs were in much the same condition. His stance had meant his left side took most of the damage, perhaps instinctively so to protect his right arm, with which he was more proficient with his keyblade. For naught though, even without the cuts, burns and annihilated hand, he was defenceless against the iron bar that must have skewered him in the blast, now pinning him to the ground. A clear foot of the material protruded from his lower abdomen, a pool of crimson spilled outward over the grass.

There wasn't any way he could possibly fix that.

There were no spells, no cure he could take.

Without magic, without Elixirs…

…

He was a dead man.

…

There wasn't anything he could do; but wait to die.

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><p>The still air quivered. A cold nip snapped through the branches. Far in the distance, a hair's breadth away, there was a dying man.<p>

The Sun rose higher, but the shadows grew longer.


End file.
